


Not Anyone's Shade

by kaesaria



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Bruises, Captive Tony, Dark, Hurt Tony, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Physical Abuse, Recovery, Rescue, shameless self-indulgent angstfest, touch issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-07-08
Packaged: 2018-07-19 23:19:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7381567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaesaria/pseuds/kaesaria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony had fought, at first.  Now he just waits.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Tony

**Author's Note:**

> Fill for Cap/Iron Man Tiny Reverse Bang (Round 2: [Breakout](http://capim-tinybang.tumblr.com/post/146450289947/cap-im-tiny-rb-round-2-breakout)). Please check out [Caz's](http://cazdraws.tumblr.com/) [lovely art](http://capim-tinybang.tumblr.com/post/146450289947/cap-im-tiny-rb-round-2-breakout)!

The light is blinding, and Tony flinches away from it. He feels his whole body stiffen, feels his stomach sink.

It’s not fair—they’d just left.  The bruises from the last beating hadn’t even had time to sink into his skin.  They’re messing with the established pattern, the routine—and it’s _not fair_. They’re supposed to give him a couple of hours to recover, to cower in the dark and to hate them in peace.  To hate himself, in the silence.

There’s a huge shadow looming in the cell entrance now, a man—a big man—silhouetted against the sterile brightness from the hallway outside.  Probably there are more waiting outside, waiting their turn.

Tony keeps his body still, keeps his eyes lowered. The light is making his eyes water, and anyway—it’s not a good idea to make eye contact.  Sometimes they read that as a show of defiance.  It makes them beat him harder.

The hulking shadow comes closer, and Tony feels his shoulders constrict.  He can’t hear anything past the deafening pound of his own heartbeat.

He should be used to this by now.  He’s been in this cell for—a long time.  He can’t tell, anymore, when one day ends and another begins.  All that exists is the safe, quiet darkness—and the unpredictable (terrifying) light.  

This is Tony’s life:  he sits in the darkness and waits for (dreads) the light.  The light brings food, water occasionally.  More often, it brings pain and shame.

He’d fought, at first.  He’d yelled and threatened and lashed out with fists and feet and teeth.  When that hadn’t worked, he’d bargained, he’d promised, he’d begged.  But they never listened to him—and they never wanted anything they couldn’t rip from him, given or not.  

It had taken him long, painful weeks to realize that, and when he did—he finally fell silent.  Now he just waits.

The shadow—the man—reaches toward him and Tony can’t help it, he turns his face away reflexively, twists his head to the side. The movement makes the sharp edges of the metal collar dig into his neck, reopen barely-healed wounds.  Tony hisses from the pain, and the corresponding rush in his ears drowns out the first words the man says to him.

Tony keeps his eyes lowered, holds his breath. It was probably an instruction—a demand—that he’d missed, something he’ll be punished for not obeying.  He tries to brace for the inevitable blow, the slap, the punch.

But when the hand finally touches him, it—doesn’t hurt. He feels a strong, calloused palm brush against his cheek, whisper soft.  The fingers curl gently around his chin and tilt his face forward until Tony sees—

A cowl—friendly somehow, familiar.  Stars and stripes and an unbreakable shield ringed with red.  Tony curls his bound hands into fists on his lap, feels something lurch in his chest.  He makes himself drag his gaze up—it’s slow going, agonizing like hope—until he’s looking into devastating (devastated) blue eyes.

“ _Tony_ ,” the man whispers.

It’s—Steve.   _Steve._

 


	2. Steve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _The hardest thing is not touching him._

The hardest thing is not touching him. 

Three and a half months doesn’t sound long, not in the course of a lifetime spanning nearly a century and still ticking on. 

But:  it was a hundred and eight days that Steve had to live on the edge of a knife—stretched to just this side of snapping, of shattering.

A hundred and eight days Steve couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat, couldn’t breathe.  A hundred and eight days of unraveling at the seams, of searching high and low and hanging onto the fraying edges of hope— _please let us find him, please let him be okay, dear God, please_.  It was a hundred and eight endless, relentless nights that Steve had to hold vigil alone in the silent emptiness of their bed.

But now he’s back.  Tony’s _back_ ; he’s alive and whole and safe and it’s all Steve can do to not fall to his knees out of sheer gratitude every time he sees him, all he can do to not to grab Tony and hold him close and never let go—

Except he _can’_ t.  Because Tony flinches every time Steve gets too near.  His muscles go rigid, his shoulders hunch.  His gaze darts up, wary, haunted; his dark eyes track Steve’s every movement, fixated and animal-afraid.

Or worse: Tony looks away.  He averts his face and refuses to meet Steve’s eyes.  His breathing goes tight, shallow as he sits rigidly still on the cot at the back of his workshop, waiting, bracing for—something.  Steve doesn’t want to ask, and Tony never tells him.

Steve tries to understand, tries to give Tony his space.  The three months had been a nightmare, a terror dream for _him_ , and he’d been at home with Sam and Bucky and all the power of the Avengers and Stark Industries behind him, helping him, shoring him up. 

For _Tony_ … all alone in that dank cell, locked up and hurt and afraid and, and probably _hopeless_ for _a hundred and eight days_ , Jesus Christ.  Steve can’t imagine, can’t begin to comprehend.

When he steps inside the workshop tonight, the lights are off.  Tony always keeps them off.  If it weren’t for the dim, ambient glow of the few screens and gadgets JARVIS leaves unobtrusively humming, even Steve’s enhanced eyesight wouldn’t be able to see a thing.  All the workbenches are still untouched, a hundred half-started projects strewn haphazardly around the cavernous space.

Steve’s careful to make a lot of unnecessary noise—to signal his approach—as he moves slowly toward the back, to where the cot is pushed up against the far wall of the large, open room.

“Hey Tony,” he says, lightly, “I brought you some food.  Clint made fajitas, they’re not half bad.  You hungry?”

A moment of dense, discordant silence, then—

“Did you remember the tabasco this time?  You know how I like to pack the heat.”  The glint of teeth, the shadow of a smirk.

And that’s the thing—Tony sounds so normal, so _okay_ ; he talks exactly the way he always has.  It makes the longing twist in Steve’s throat, sharp and acrid. 

This is _his_ Tony, the same as he’s always been, whole and undamaged—as long as Steve ignores the stiffness in his back, the way his eyes flicker in the dim light, watching Steve’s approach, guarded, alert, as he inches closer.  As long as Steve ignores the barely-perceptible sag of relief that runs through Tony’s body once he’s sure Steve will back away once the tray is carefully placed on the cot next to him. 

This is his Tony—as long as Steve keeps a safe six feet of space between them.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I’m using this to fill the _Locked In_ box on my [Stony bingo card](http://kaesaria.tumblr.com/post/142381886309/my-updated-stony-bingo-card-deadline-for-fills). 
> 
> All feedback is hugely appreciated. You can also discuss this story (or anything else) with me on [Tumblr](http://kaesaria.tumblr.com/). **(ETA: And now also on Imzy.[Come play with me!](https://www.imzy.com/kaesaria))**


End file.
